THE

MEDIEVAL CONTRIBUTION
TO POLITICAL THOUGHT
THOMAS AQUINAS
MARSILIUS OF PADUA
RICHARD HOOKER

BY

...
ALEXANDER PASSERIN D'ENTREVES
D.PHIJ:.., PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY OF I.AW
IN THE VNlVJ:RSITY OF PAVIA

THE HUMANITIES PRESS

New York 1959
First Published in 1939 by Oxford University Press

Reprinted 1959 by The Humanities Press

by special arrangement. with
Oxford University Press

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 PREFACE
T HE lectures printed in the present volume were delivered in
the University of Oxford during the Summer term, 1938.
Notwithstanding the obvious defects of lectures appearing in book
form, I have preferred to preserve their original character, both for
sentimental reasons and because it is no part of their purpose to
present a complete narrative of thi: development of medieval political
thought.
The argument of the first four lectures mainly corresponds to
that of my Italian book, La filosojia politica medioevale, published
in 1934. The material for lectures V and VI was brought together
in England during the years 1926-9, when I was awarded a travel-
ling fellowship on the Rockefeller Foundation. Part of the argu-
ment I submitted as a doctoral dissertation on Hooker in 1932.
A further account both of the sources I have used and of several
questions which I have been unable fully to develop in the lectures
can be found in my book, Riccardo Hooker (1932).
My indebtedness to contemporary thinkers I have tried to record
in the text, but I should like to acknowledge particularly the in-
fluence of my Balliol years, and the encouragement which I received
from teachers and fellow students in England. I owe an immense
debt of gratitude to Dr. A. J. Carlyle, who assisted my work from
the beginning; to Mr. A. D. Lindsay for many stimulating discus-
, sions; to Professor R. H. Tawney for his penetrating criticism; to
Mr. B. H. Sumner and to Mr. R. N. Carew Hunt for their appre-
ciation and friendship. I should like to express my grateful thanks
to the University authorities and to the Master and Fellows of
· Balliol for arranging these lectures, and to Professor F. M. Powicke
for all that he has done on behalf of their publication. I am
greatly obliged to Miss Margaret Carlyle for revising my English,
and to Mr. R. W. Sbuthern for his invaluable help in making
my argument more consistent with English usage and ways of
thought.
.August- 1938. A. P. »'E.
18 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
conception of sovereignty which is usually, though not
quite accurately, associated with that of absolutism. But
it is important to remember that its influence could not but
foster
/
a belief in natural law as the basis of all legal order.
1t was, in fact, this idea of natural law which helped to
justify the restoration of the Roman system, on account
of its very reasonableness and universal value, as the law
of an international civilization,,..,.... And
. it is through the
vehicle of natural law that the old idea of the independence
of law as against the state was transmitted to later ages.
It is on this basis that the recognition of a legal order
superior to the state has found momentous development
even in more recent days, as th~ modern theory of inter-
_national law sufficiently proves!The real and far-reaching
challenge to the medieval idea of the priority of law as the
embodiment of justice comes from a different sidef We.
shall see its beginnings in Marsilius, but we find its com-
plete development only in Machiavelli and Hegel. It is
the doctrine that the state itself, however (as it undoubtedly
is in Marsilius) democratically ordered, and however (as
again in Marsilius) limited in its executive power, is the
embodiment ofjustice, and thus the source oflaw. Against
this stands the traditional notion of the law of nature as the
ultimate source of all legal values. The new idea shakes
the whole structure of medieval thought and shifts the
religious, the philosophical, and the legal bases of political
obligation; and we are left to wonder which of the twQ
opposing views, still openly defying one another, will in
the end prevail.
 II
THOMAS AQUINAS

T HOMAS OF AQUINO (r225-74) is not only the

greatest representative· of Scholastic philosophy and
the most constructive and systematic thinker of the
Middle Ages. He is also and foremost the typical exponent
of what a recent historian has called the catholic mind.~
To him we owe an elaborate programme of tliii thorough
christianization of human life which inspired the medieval
ideal, and was soon to be celebrated in the immortal poem
of Dante. In the formidable apparatus of his work all the
aspects and issues of that programme are discussed, all the
means of historical, scientific, and philosophical know-
ledge of the time are us~d to secure its realization. It is
sometimes lamented that St. Thomas should not have left
us a clear and definite account of his own political theory;
but it is fairly easy to reconstruct the main outlines of that
theory from the several indications which are contained
in his work, provided that we never forget the general
:frame into which they fit, and from which they draw their
.·significance. Such indications are to be found; in almost
all C?f St. Thomas's works, from the Commentary on the
Sentences of Peter Lombard to the great Summae, from the
Commentaries on the Ethics and Politics of Aristotle to the
little treatise De Regimine Principum. The latter writings
would at first sight appear the most appropriate source for
the knowledge of Thomistic political theory; but the use
which we can make of them is hampered by the doubts
·which have been raised as to the authenticity of some of
. their parts, and by the very limitation of the problems
· which are dealt with in them. However, the particular
20 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
aspects of the doctrine matter much less than the funda-
mental problem around which the whole of Aquinas's
political thought can be said to centre, and this in turn
can only be understood in relation to the main body of
~Thomistic philosophy. J:bis..fnndamental problem is that'
of ~-na.tu.re__l!!'J.d val~ of political e~e.-----
....1 have endeavourea1nthe preceamglecture to illustrate
the different issues which this problem raised to the
medieval mind. As in all other fields of philosophical
speculation, the rediscovery of Aristotelian philoso h in
the thirteenth centu had a ro ound an su den effect
in t e e o po 1tical theory. The class1ca conception
ofthe state, whic~ained in the writings of Aris-
totle, was j.~_ its v:ery _e~sen_ce ()E_P~~-~d !9. th~_b_ody_Qf ideas'~
and __~octrines which had constituted the traditiol'.lal start:;
ing-point of Christian political thought. Dr. Carlyle, in
his History of Mediaeval Political Theory in the West, has
given us some striking examples of the tenacity with
which these older ideas held ground down to the very eve
of the recovery of Aristotelian political theory. He has
provided evidence of their presence in the works of Albert
the Great, the teacher of St. Thomas Aquinas, by whom
the grafting of Aristotelianism on to the body of Christian
thought was begun; a task which his famous pupil was
to complete. The proper meaning and the historical
significance of the political theory of Thomas Aquinas
thus appear strictly correlative to his great enterprise of
reconciling Aristotelianism and Christianity, and to the
philosophical, or rather metaphysical premisses which
seemed to make that conciliation possible. This metaphy-
sical premiss must be mentioned briefly, for it has a direct
bearing upon the essence and meaning of Thomistic
political thought. It is th~ idea of a fundamental ha-t~J
 THOMAS AQUINAS 2~
b~ um dr ··us es enr na
.~n giving a clear formulation to this idea, Thomistic
~phy appeared to express the deep and intimate
aspiration of medieval Christianity, so different in its atti-
tude towards the world and nature from the diffidence
and hostility of the early Christian, and the rigid alterna-
tives which had been stressed by St. Augustine. Human
t'al~ths ar~t necessarily obliterated by the
revela~_Qf..hlgh.e.r_oJ:l~~.;~ow~~~~..~9..4.~§!__~E9:~'Yt. they
cf~erve _!~~-~-~onsidered as possible to~ls _for !h_e_great
~~ ~fbuil4i_11g ~l:'_Chri~~ian _c~i~~tiOn. In St. Thomas's
assertion, gratia non to/lit naturam, sed perjicit, there is
the re nition of the existence and digni of a purely
'na..tl!tal' sphere of rational and ethic values. · is essen-
tially 'human' standara of justice is not vitiated by sin nor
absorbed in tlle glare of abso1Ute ~d dmne justice; it is
rather the first and necessary step in the long ascent to-.
wards the fulfilment of the Christian ideal. This spher~
of natural and human values finds its complete expression 1

.in the idea of natural law, which thus appears as the

proper ground upon which social ai:d political relation/
can be secured and comprehended.
A complete analysis of the Thomist idea of natural law
.is out o.f_~~·-q~gtio.n. The best descriptlon of its purpose
and1:Ileaning is perhaps that which has been made many
times, of.a bridge thrown, as it were, across the gulf which,,
divides man from his divine Creator.I In natural law is
expresse i and power of man, and thus of his
reason, which allows him, alone of created beings, to ·
participate intellectually and actively in the rational orde~
of the universe. This explains the s~ which is laid in
Thomistic philosophy upon the ideas of reason and order
(ordinatio), which in turn are developed into a complete
 22 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT·
and elaborate philosophy of law./ w itself is conceived
as the expression not s uc o the will as of the reason
of the le~ator: it is, in St. Thomas's well-known expres-
sion, aliquid~fo'n1f,°in ordinatio rationis;lThis definition
itself has momentous theological, as wellas legal implica-
tions. It has remained ever since as the highest expression
of an 'intellectualistic' as against a 'volunta.ris..tif:__!!i~Q!Y
~ It is the .t;Y to a proper understanding of that
'rationalistic' bent which is one of the distinctive features
ofT'homistic philosophy. Its decisive influence is to be
felt in every aspect of St. Thomas's political theory. But'
•above all, it explains his attitude towards the problem of
p_Q.li!ical obligation, and his acceptance of~theory, like that
of Aristotle, which involved a rational explanation of the
state ·and attributed a positive value to social and E_9}itical
jnstitutions, as being grounded in the veri--natiil:e-of man.-
As Dr. Carlyle has pointed out, St. Thoma-s did not-in
all respects directly and categorically contradict _the-elder
explanation of ~hose institutions as the-res-lik--o.f,._~nd divine
remedy for, sin. The idea of sin and of its ~onsequences
remained for him, and could not but remain, a fundamental
dogma of the Christian faith. But, as St. Thomas ex-
pressly puts it, ..§iv. itself has not invalidated ~ia
11.j.turae. , Its consequences, therefore, only concern the
possibility of man's fulfilling the dictates of the ~aturqfis
ratio, not his capacity of ~ttaining to their knowledge: in
other words they do not shatter in the least the existence ·
of a sphere of purely natural ethical values, and it is in this
sphere that the state and political relations find their~n
d'2tr.e. It....has been rightly remarked that the different
manner of conceiving the necessity and foundation of the
state, before and after St. Thomas, derives from a differ:.
ent conception of human nature: iD:~tead oi.£gnsidering
 THOMAS AQUINAS 23
the. ~tate as an institution which may well be necess~
and divinely appointed, bu!-0.nly i~ view of th~ actUal con-
ditions ~fa corrupted mankind, Thqmas A uina_sfollowed
Aristotle in d~g the idea of~-~!~~e f~?_!Il__t~e very
{iijiire of ;;ii). But here again the idea of natural law;-an
the con,ception of a harmonious correspondence ~een
the natural and the revealed order which it expressed,
provided a solid ground for further developments. For
the Aristotelian conception, with its insistence upon the
'natural' character of the state and its exaltation of the
state itself as the fu.Uiiffi~nt-~nd-~nd of human naturE.>..con-
tained at bottom a@aneD;lto the Christian idea of the•
existence of higher and ultimate values, and of the inade-
quacy of merely human means for their attainment. Th/
natural order, whi~mprises and su~ntly justifies
f"poli~~ience, is for St. Thomas only a condition and
a meanlt for the existence ofiliigner orcler;as-natura;paw
-is but. a part of t~e.t.ema.Ua:w-e.fGod.._Tfgratza-nO";i._rollit
naturam, certainly also natura non tol!i!._gratiam, and nature
requires to be perfected by grace. [Jhus the action and ·
value of the state, as part of the natural order, must be
considered in the general frame of the divine direction of
the world, and is entireiffu1iSffYieut fo-tliai-airecflon._
~ition of the value of political experience is thus
subjected to a very important qualification. But it is this
clear-cut delimitation which made it possible for St.
(thomas to attempt his conciliation of the classical and of
(!he Christian ideal of the state, and, within these well-
drawn limits, the influence of Aristotelian ideas caused
a deep and thorough-going reconstruction of medieval
~tical thought.
Political institutions are, then, according to St. Thomas,
an aspect or part of 'natural' morality. As such they can
24 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT.
be considered~ndjustified on a purely human plane, inde-
pendently of religious values, which do not alter the
natural order of which the state is a necessary expression.
This implies that even a non-Christian or pagan state is
endowed with a positive value, as against St. Augustine's
conception of the pagan state as the embodiment of the
civitas terrena and the work of sin. This idea is expressed
in a well-known passage of the Summa Theologica: 1
'It must be granted that government and authority are derived from
human law, while the distinction between believers and unbelieven
is introduced by divine law. Now the divine law, which is founded
on grace, does not abolish human law, whic · es from natural
reason. Hence the distinction between believers and unbe 1evers,
considered in itself, does not abolish the government and authority of
unbelievers over believers. Such a right of government or authority
can, however, be justly abolished by the decision of the Church:
for unbelievers, on account of their unbelief, deserve to lose their
power over believers, who are become the sons of God. But this the
Church sometimes decrees and sometimes not.'
~ It is here very clearly stated that political a_,µthority has0
f value of its own, independent of religious belief; and it
1has such value as the expression of a natural and rational
larder. The intervention of the spiritual power, of the
Church, may sometimes deprive the non-Christian ruler of
his authority; but such intervention is justified on the ground
of that general mission of control of the Church upon the
temporal sphere which will be examined shortly. It in ·no
1 Summa Tlzeol. n 2ae, q. x, a. 10: 'Considerandum est, quod dominium et
praelatio introducta. sunt ex jure humano; distinctio autem f.delium et infidelium
estexjuredivino. Jus autem divinum, quodestex gratia,non tollitjus humanum,
quod est ex naturali ratione. Ideo distinctio fidelium et infidelium, secundum se
considerata, non tollit dominium et praelationem infidelium supra fideles.
Potest tamen juste per sententiam vel ordinationem Ecclesiae ... tale jus dominii i
vel praelationis tolli: quia infideles merito suae infidelitatis merentur potestatem ·i·.'
amittere super fideles, qui transferuntur in filios Dei. Sed hoc quidem Ecclesia
quandoque facit, quandoque autem non facit.'
 THOMAS AQUINAS
way qualifies the statement that political authority is in
itself fully justified as an expression of human and natural
law. Let us notice once again how the question is referred:
back to the fundamental principle that grace does._pot}
( abolish nature: the justification of the state and of political
\.institutions must thus be sought in the very nature of man.
This is precisely the leading idea which St. Thomas
derives from Aristotle. Few expressions are repeated so
often, every time St. Thomas approaches the problem of
politics, as that, homo naturaliter est animal politicum et
sociale (ut Philosophus dicit, ut probatur in 1° Politicae,
&c.). I must leave it to better philologists than myself to
ascertain whether and up to what point the Thomist ex-
"
pression animal sociale et politicum'·may be said to corre-
spond to tlie Aristotelian ?To~mKov '~ov. But if, as I be-
lieve, the Aristotelian notion oft~ political nature of man,
as developed in the first book of Politics; somehow includes
the noti~f a social consciousness, and of the necessity /
for the_ ~~te havi~g its dee:Rest roo~~j-~oc~-~ e~rience ;
--over and agai11st the opposite and Machiay~~n:.~
ceptio~ the s~te as a ·worK:o£art;the creation of a ~
_powerful but single will-the Thomist expression can be
, said to render fairly adequately the more important aspect
of the Aristotelian conception of politics. 1 The importance
which St. Thomas attributes to tha_t sonception is ex-
plained by him over and over again.i__ln one place2 he de-
scribes man as subject to a triplex ordo, dhi_ne law, reason,
and political authoricy: this last is necessary in view of
1 It is interesting to notice that William of Moerbecke, in bis latin translation
of the Politics, translated 7TIWTucov ~,Pov animal civik, and this express.ion is
maintained by St. Thomas in his Commentary on the Politics in William of
Moerbecke's translation. But the words animal sociak et politicum are constantly
used in the Summa Tneologica and in the several other works relating to politics.
z Summa Tneol. ia :iae, q. lxxii, a. 4.
4547 E
26 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
.lhe social and political nature of man, for ~~n
ha,d been by nature a solitary animal, the order of reason
and that of revealed law would have been sufficient. Hence
the necessity; if man is to attain his proper end and realize
the highest form of life and virtue, of his sharing in
political life, and of his practising the virtutes politicae. 1
It is extremely interesting in this respect to observe
St. Thomas's attitude in his Commentary on the Politics
of Aristotle towards the Aristotelian doctrine of the 'mon-
strous' condition of man deprived or abstracted from
political life. St. Thomas was forced to make an express
reservation in favour of asceticism, in favour of the idea of
a higher degree of perfection to be attained by retiring
from the world rather than by participating in it. But he
did not fail to emphasize the exceptional character of a
life of this kind, and the necessity, for the attainment of
such an ideal, of more than human capacities :2
'If any man should be such that he is not a political being by nature,
he is either wicked-as when this happens through the corruption
of human nature--or he is better than man-in that he has a nature
more perfect than that of other men in general, so that he is able to
be sufficient to himself without the society of men, as were John the
Baptist and St. Anthony the hermit.'
The idea of the social and political nature of man leads
to an emphatic assertion of the full and harmonious inte-
gration of individual life in the life of the community ;3
z Summa Tlzeol. 1a 2ae, q. lxi, a. 5.
,.2 Commentary 07l tlze Politics, lib. I, lectio 1: 'Sed si aliquis homo habeat
quod non sit civilis propter naturam, aut nequam est, utpote cum hoc contingit
ex corruptione naturae humanae, aut est melior quam homo, in quantum scilicet
habet naturam perfectiorem aliis hominibus communiter, ita quod per se sibi
possit sufficere absque hominum societate; sicut fuit in Joanne Baptista, et beato
Antonio heremita.
3 Summa Theo!. za :iae, q. xcii, a. 1: 'Cum igitur quilibet homo sit pars civita-
tis, impossibile est quod aliquis homo sit bonus nisi sit bene proportionatus bono
comm uni.'
 THOMAS AQUINAS
'Since therefore each man is a part of the city, it is impossible that
any man should be good unless he is well-pr~portioned to the
common good.'
But what is the ultimate meaning of such 'integration'?
Does it not imply in some way a belittlement, if not
actually a denial of the value of human .I?.el'.'sonality ? Does
it not lead to a complete absorption of individual life in
that of the state? Here lay one of the greatest dangers of
the return of the pagan conception of the state, which,
as was shown by further development of the Aristotelian
influence, menaced the fundamental Christian iQ.~a_ 9fthe
supreme value of human personality. Ifine-.;hole iij)rior
to its p~rts, if the ena-oftlie-moiVidual~_thaf
of the community, how can the value of human personality
be secured? Does not the state become a sort of Le~n
which devours and annu~dllaT?--rhat sucli.
views are ridicilly inco~atibkwlt1itheChristian teach-
ing is clear not only to the modern student; it was realized
very soon by medieval writers, and it was on this very
ground that the charge of heresy was brought against so
good a Thomjs~an~. It is therefore of the greatest
imp~ that we should correctly understand and inter-
pret St. Thomas's teaching on this momentous issue. But
this is far from being an easy task. J According to St.
Thomas, the common good is undoubtedly more impor-
tant than that of the individual: majus et divinius est
bonum multitudinis quam bonum unius. 1 But what is the real
difference petween the one and the other? In a passage of
the Summa Theologica, quoting Aristotle, St. Thomas
seems to conceive of a di~q_ufility..: 2
1 De Regim. Prine. I, cap. ix: id. in Summa Theo!., 2a ue, q. xxxi, a. 3.
'ISumma Theo!. 2a 2ae, q. lviii, a. 7: 'Bonum commune civitatis et bonum
singulare unius personae non diff'erunt solum secundum multum et paucum, sed
secundum formalem di1ferentiam: alia est ratio boni communis et boni singularis,
28 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
'The common good of the city and the individual good of each
person not only differ as being, the one more, the other less, but
they are different in kind. The essence of the common good is differ-
ent from that of the individual good, as that of the whole differs from
that of the part. And hence the Philosopher in the first book of the
Politics says that it is wrong to assert that the city and the household
and other similar associations differ only in quantity and not in· kind.'
The doctrine that the end of the whole is of a different
quality from that of the part is a dangerous one, as the
Dominican critic of Dante, Guido Vernani, writing in the
early fourteenth century, 1 was at pains to demonstrate on
the evidence of St. Augustine, St. Thomas, and Aristotle
themselves. Yet on the other hand, in the De Regimine
Principum, resuming the elaborate theory of ends which
is expounded in the third book of the Summa contra Gen-
tiles, St. Thomas openly acknowledges that the end of the
single individual and that of the whole cannot and must
not be judged on different standards ('idem autem oportet
esse judicium de :fine totius multitudinis et unius'), and that
in fact the end of the one and of the other are substan-
tially the same ('oportet eundem finem esse multitudinis
humanae qui est hominis unius'). 2 This must mean that
the difference between the end of the individual and that
ff the whole can only be a difference in_ quantity, and not
in quality; that, in other words, the 'integration' of the
individual in the whole must be conceived of as an
enlargement and an enrichment of human personality, not
as a degradation of the individual to the mere function of -
a part with no value of its own. Thus the Christian idea
sicut alia est ratio totius et partis. Et ideo Philosophus, in 1° Polit. (cap. I), dicit
quod "non bene dicunt civitatem et domum et alia hujusmodi differre solom
multitudine et paucitate, et non specie".'
i De PotestaU Summi Pontijids et de nprohatione Monarc!Jiae compositae a

Dante .Aligherio, 1327.

z De &gitn. Prine. I, cap. xiv.
 THOMAS AQUINAS 291
of the value of individual personality appears to be safe-
guarded, and is further reasserted in the conception, which
has been analysed above, that however paramount and
importa.D.t the state may appear for the fulfilment of human
nature, political life is in its turn but a condition and means
for the attainment of a higher type of perfection. This
again implies that the individual can never be completely
absorbed by the state, that something in him is reserved
for·a higher end: 'man is not formed for political fellowship
in his entirety, and in all that he has ... but all that a man
is, and can do, and has, must be directed to God'. 1 Clearly,
the revival of the classical and pagan ideal of the state
called for very important and substantial qualifications.
And yet, notwithstanding such qualifications, the teach-
ing of Aristotle bore in the political thought of Aquinas
some remarkable fruit. This is well seen in St. Thomas's
treatment of the origin of the state and political institu-
tions. According to Aristotle, the problem of the 9rigin
of the state is entirely inc!_epend~t of that of its rational
justj_ficatiQD.. The doctrine of the political nature of man
primarily implies the idea that, whatever the earliest con-
ditions of mankind, the political condition is its 'natural'
one. It is therefore quite pointless to argue about the
causes of some supposed change in man, and to seek in
them an explanation and justification of the state and
political institutions. There is no place in such a doctrine
for a contrast between 'nature' and 'convention'. The
influence of this doctrine upon St. Thomas is clearly
apparent in his treatment of the idea of a state
..... of nature or
status innocentiae, which is the oE.ject Qf care::-iru~1-.1d~iscussion
1 Summa Tlzeol. ra :iae, q. :xxi, a. 4' ad 3""':·'Homo non ordinatur ad com-

munita.tem politicam secundum se totum, et secundum omnia sua•••• Sed totum

quod homo est, et quod potest et habet, ordinandum est ad Deum.'
30 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
in the first part of the Summa Theologica. The whole tradi-
tion of Stoic and Christian political philosophy was con-
sonant and dogmatic on this point. The teaching of the
Fathers could leave no doubts on the subject of the
original condition in which mankind had been placed by
God. St. Augustine, in a well-known passage which St.
Thomas do~s not fail to remember, had stated that God
made the<(.~~ man to be the master of other animals,
not of his ~men, thus showing by visible signs what
is the proper order of nature and what are the conse-
quences of sin. 1 The traditional doctrine of the law of
nature, transmitted in the works of the Roman lawyers and
in Justinian's Corpus Juris, had even more emphatically
asserted the original freedom and equality of all men,
and contrasted the institutions which can be referred to
the ius naturale with those, such as property, slavery, and
existing political organization, which are grounded upon
the ius gentium. Here again St. Thomas does not direct!}:_,
and categorically contradict these conceptions. His \
answer to the difficulty raised by the contrast of two oppo- \
site modes of thought clearly shows his efforts of adapta- \
tion and the balance of his mind. It may be scorned as a J
typical instance of scholastic distinguo, but the distinction_..;
is important an_d far-reaching in its results. The funda-
mental equality of human nature, a capital tenet of the
Christian faith, cannot be doubted. But the actual in-
equalities which are inherent in social and political con-
ditions must be carefully assessed. St. Thomas here
distinguished between subiectio servilis and subiectio civilis.
The first is undoubtedly contrary to nature, and can there-
fore only be explained as a consequence of sin. But the
latter, the relationship of authority and obedience between
I De Civitate Dei, xix. I 5.
 THOMAS AQUINAS 31
men which is necessary for the attainment of the good of
all, in a word, political relationship, is by no means a con-
sequence of sin, for it is founded upon the very nature of
man. Such a relationship would therefore no doubt exist
even if the status innocentiae had been preserved. The
reason for this is again that, according to Aristotle, man is
a social, and hence""~"E'R~tjcal animal. 1 The combination
of the two opposite· dq_c_triries is clearly apparent, but it is
important that the idea of sin, without being rejected,
should be confined to narrow limits, merely to explain
some necessary hardships of social and political experience,
such as the penal character of laws, or the existence of
tyrants. But the idea of sin has no part in the rational
· justification of the state, and the way is thus clear for the
reception of a large part of Aristotelian teaching.
The same balance between opposite doctrines, and the
same understanding of the value of Aristotle's ideas,
appears in the remaining sections of St. Thomas's. poli-
tical theory. In these he is concerned more directly with
~~e~l!th~h-~
aWim~fo~nc~an~e~
.m._ent. AT~ · s · r~gaajo.-~_s.~~.~1
pr~ the ·e an~
~imi~g.ng;1•~9!Ss.ism. The causes of this particular
interest lie in the fact that since the acceptance ofAquinas's
teaching as representing somehow the official expression
and foundation of the teaching of the Catholic Church, it
has become of the highest importance to ascertain its
proper meaning, and to explain how St. Thomas's author-
ity has been claimed to support widely different attitudes,
varying from the maintenance of almost democratic tenets
at the time of the Counter-reformation to the almost
1 Summa Tlzeol. 1a, q. xcii, a. 1, and q. xcvi.
 32 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
unconditional acceptance of absolutism in later days. Our
Italian liberals of the period of the Risorgimento-, such as
Bertrando Spaventa, did not fail to point out this apparently
inexplicable contradiction. Here again St. Thomas's posi-
tion can only be understood by distinguishing the different
lines of approach which he endeavoured to reconcile.
With regard to the problem of the foundation and
sources of authority, it is fairly easy to distinguish the
various doctrines which have left their traces on St.
Thomas's thought. The idea that the foundation of
political power, or to ~seexpressions more consonant with
tlie medievil vocabulary, the source of the authority of the
law, lies in the community, is, as Dr. Carlyle has never
tired of warning us, one ofthe"'chief principles of mcdieYal
..Political thought. It is one to which, as he again has con-
CIUsively shown, both the older view of the supremacy of
customary law and the revival of Roman conceptions
equally contributed. For however different in their pre-
misses and practical implications, they could both be
interpreted, and were in fact interpreted, as expressing the
idea that the people is the only ultimate source of-law and
of political authority. But although this idea can un-
doubtedly be traced in several passages of St. Thomas's
works, we are by no means authorized to read into his
teaching, as some interpreters have done, an assertion of the
idea of popular sovereignty. (_Although clearly admitting
that the proper foundation ofl~w and authority is the will,
or at least the consent of the community, St. Thomas
nowhere committed himself to anything which may be
said to approach even remotely the idea of an 'original'
or 'natural' right of the people) Hence the acknowledge-
ment of the human source of authority can be reconcile~
with the fundamental Christian idea of its divine and
 THOMAS AQUINAS 33
sacred character; if 'dominium et praelatio introducta sunt
ex iure humano', it is also true that 'non est potestas nisi a
Deo'. This distinction and reconciliation assumes in one
place1 the aspect of a typically scholastic distinction
. between 'form' and 'substance', between the causa f ormalis
-
and the causa materialis of authority. The ultimate divine
source of all authority (causa formalis) does not exclude,
· but on the contrary requires a determination of its actual
human and historical origin (causa materialis). But there
is a third motive, along with these two traditional ones,
whose influence is clearly to befelt in St. Thomas's theory
of the foundation of power: it is the Aristotelian idea
that, since political relationship is grounded in nature, the
real foundation of the ordo inter homines' must be sought in
the different capacities of men, m t1lru 'natural' inequality.
Hence the best ordinatio of the humanum regimen is that
which corresponds most closely to t~at inequality, and
respects that p_raeeminentia inte/lectus -which is the real!
justification of power. This lends to St. Thomas's teach-\
ing a much more aristocratic than democratic flavour. 2 ~
When from the problem of the source of authority we
_turn to that of obedience, it is obvious that the influence
of Aristotelian ideas will not be so clearly visible, for this
problem assumed in Christian political theory an im-
portance unknown to the classical world. This is the
direct result of the Christian ideas of divided allegiance
and of the religious value of obedience. And yet it is of
great interest to notice that, according to St. Thomas, the
duty of obedience is not only a precept of divine law, '
directly traceable to the biblical texts which have already
1 Comm. on the Sent. II, dist. xliv, q. ii, a. 2.
2 Cp. Summa Tlzeol. 1a, q. xcii, a. 1; q. xcvi, a. 4; and esp. Summa contra Gent.
Ill, c. 81.
4547 p
34 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
'been quoted, but also a precept of natural law. This pre-
cept allows of a rational justific~on, which is grounded
precisely upon the Aristotelian argument of the natural
foundation of the political relationship. 1 With regard to
the limits of obedience, the detailed analysis of the several
issues raised in St. Thomas's careful discussion cannot be
attempted here. It is enough to remember the main prin-
ciple which St. Thomas develops, that, as the duty of
obedience to authority is grounded both upon divine and
upon natural order, its limits are necessarily fixed by the
correspondence of human authority with divine and natural ·
law, that is, with justice. This leading idea is developed
in the discussion of the value of human law in the section
De Legibus of the Summa Theologica,z and formulated with
all possible clearness in the section De Obedientia :J
'It must be said that a man is so far obliged to obey seeular princes,
as the order of justice requires; hence if their authority is not just
but usurped, or if they command that which is unjust, a subject is
not obliged to obey, except, according to the circumstances, to avoid
scandal or peril'

The practical applications of this principle, the determina-

tion of the modes and consequences of an eventual refusal
of obedience, necessarily lead to a complex c~j The
most discussed instance is that relating to the possibility
of active resistance, which to some interpreters has
appeared to imply nothing less than an authorization of
tyrannicide: a theory which, as is well known, found
x Summa Theo/. za zae, q. civ, a. r.
2 Ibid. ra zae, q. xcvi.
, Ibid. za zae, q. civ-cv: 'Dicendum, quod principibus secularibus in tantum
homo obedire tenetur, in quantum ordo justitiae requirit: et ideo si non habbant
justum principatum, sed usurpatum, vel si injusta praecipiant, non tenentur\eis
subditi obedire, nisi forte per accidens, propter vitandum scandalum vel peri-
culum.'
 THOMAS AQUINAS 35
some famous applications in the hands of Catholic writers
of later days. In my opinion, although St. Thomas's
apparent justification of tyrannicide is accompanied by
important qualifications which practically amount to a
fiat disavowal of it, there can be no doubt of his acknow-
ledgement not only of the right, but of the duty of resis-
tance to an unjust power. 1 His teaching on the subject
can thus be said to bear witness to that transformation of
the Christian doctrine of obedience into a doctrine exactly
opposed to the theory of passive obedience held by older
and later Christian political thinkers. I have already
pointed out that this transformation is one of the most
characteristic features of medieval political theory.
We find ourselves again in touch with Aristotelian ideas
when, from the discussion of authority and obedience, we
turn -~o the determination of the forms and aspects of
political organization and to the definition of the nature
and essence of the communitas_ perfecta, or what we should
call the attributes of the state. The decisive influence of
the Aristotelian definition of the state upon the develop-
ment of medieval political thought has been vividly
depicted by Gierke. It is evident, he notes, that as soon
as men take this definition in earnest, only some among
the various subordinated and superordinated communities
can be regarded as being states. ffhus the revival of the'
classical conception of the state helped to destroy the
medieval ideal of a univer~al community or imperium
mundi; and it prepared the way for the modern idea of
the particular and sovereign state.~ St. Thomas's teaching'
affords a striking confirmation;df this trend of ideas
which has been described by Gierke. The state, as the
1 Cp. Comm. rm the Sent. II, dist. xliv, q. ii; Summa Tkeol. :za :zae, q. xlii, a. :z.;
D~ &gimme Prine. I, cap. vi.
36 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
communitas perfecta, is, according to St. Thomas, of an
intrinsically different nature from all other communities.
This difference can be inferred from the state's capacity
for making laws endowed with a poJ,estas coacti'Jl...a~ and its
possession of a 'sufficientia ad omnia necessaria vitae',
the two Aristotelian attributes of autopgmy and autarchy.
These requisites are fulfilled by two main types of organiza-
tion, the ci!JJiJJas. and the ~' which thus deserve the
name of communitates perfectae; clearly, the Aristotelian
notion of the 11"6>..ts undergoes a noteworthy extension.
But in its essence, it is the Aristotelian notion of the parti-
cular state which bears full sway. There is no open men-
tion, in the whole of St. Thomas's work, of the idea of a
universal empire. Many explanations have been given of
this curious fact, and they may all contain some part of
the truth. But, strange though it is that St. Thomas should
have been silent on an issue usually considered as the very
backbone of medieval political thought, the causes of this
silence are not so important as its implications. Does it
imply a complete abandonment of the ideal of a superior
unity of mankind, transcending the particularism of single
political units and expressing an aspiration for absolute
values? This, and this alone, would be a sign that the
continuity of medieval thought had undergone a sudden
and far-reaching interruption. But this is certainly not th~
case with St. Thomas. The idea of the fundamental unity
i of human life, for one thing, undoubtedly inspires the
~whole of St. Thomas's philosophy oflaw, with its assertion
of the unity and universal value of the supreme principles
of justice, from which the several systems of positive law
derive their substance and value. The same idea is pre-
served in the conception of the corpus mysticun{__ ecclesiae
and of the unus populus christianus, which embraces and
 THOMAS AQUINAS 37
unites the widest variety of countries and nations. 1 But
above all it is preserved in the idea of the supreme divine
government of the world, which is the highest expression
of that principium unitatis, of that ordinatio ad unum which,
as Gierke again pointed out, assumed in medieval eyes the
·value of a constituent principle- of the universe. Thus
behind or above the manifold human types of life and
political experience there is a fundamental oneness: as
St. Thomas expressly puts it, 'etsi sint multi regentes,
eius (scil. Dei) regimini omnes subduntur'. 2
When from the definition of the state and its attributes
we turn to consider its r an· on true e, we are
confronted with a further confirmation of the tenacity
with which medieval conceptions still hold their ground
in St. Thomas's political theory. The influence of Aristo-
telian ideas is here practically neutralized, as appears from
the very method with which St. Thomas sets about to
determine the best form of government. This, as is ex-
pressly set forth in the second chapter of the De Regimine
Principum, must be determined in accordance with the
highest and most abstract metaphysical premisses, of
which the lesson of experience can only provide a con-
_firmation. Th s the · as
th~~~!.l.t-~~!Y~~
~ first and foremost among them is the argu-
ment derived from the principium unitatis, upon which
Dante was soon to base his abstract deductions in the first
book of the Monarchia. Yet, when it comes to defining the
organization of monarchy, and to facing some funda-
mental issues such as the relation of the ruler to the law, or
the nature of tyranny, the influence of, and the reference
1 Summa Theo!. 3a, q. viii, a. i-+; Summa t:ontra Gent. IV, c. 76.
z Summa t:ontra Gent. III, c. t.
 38 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
to, actual historical experience are deep and continuous.
I am afraid that I shall have to omit a complete analysis of
this interesting section of St. Thomas's political theory,
and content myself with a brief summary of what in my
opinion are its more importa~t aspects. With regard to
the problem of tyranny, the teaching of St. Thomas in the
,.Commentary on the Sentences appears to contain the germ of
a distinction which bore its fruits in later thinkers. 1 This
is the distinction between tyranny ex parte exercitii and
tyranny ex defectu tituli, of which the important develop-
ments in fourteenth- and :fifteenth-century Italian political
theory, from Bartolus to Coluccio Salutati, are well known.
With regard to the relation of the prince to the law,
St. Thomas's discussion of the Roman principles 'quad
principi placuit legis habetvigorem' and 'princeps legibus
solutus', 2 is of capital importance for the history of the
influence of Roman legal ideas upon medieval political
thought. I have pointed out in my preceding lecture that
the reconstruction and appreciation of that influence by
the modern historian appears to me to be vitiated by an
.undue simplification of its complexity, and by the attri-
bution to it of the largest share of responsibility for the
spread of those 'absolutist' ideas which led to the final dis-
•ruption of medieval political theory. An attentive study
of St. Thomas's position should be a safeguard against
such tendentious interpretations. For St. Thomas shows
a thorough understanding of the Roman doctrine of the
superiority of the prince (or of whoever has the function
of making law, which may also belong to the whole multi-
tude) to the law from the point of view of mere legal
experience; that is to say, with regard to positive law. It
I Camm. ta tlze Smt. II, dist. xliv, q. ii. (
2 Summa Tlzeal. 1a zae, q. xc, a. 1; q. xcvi, a. 5.
 THOMAS AQUINAS 39
is from the authority of the prince, or, generally speaking,
from the potestas publica, that law derives its vis coactiva,
its positive legal value. Hence, with regard to this vis
coactiva, the potestas publica is really legibus soluta. This
acknowledgement of a principle which, without qualifica-
tion, is substantially nothifrg' else than the principle of
sovereignty, ought to induce reflection in the many who
still repeat the old slogan that 'there was no conception of
sovereignty in the Middle Ages'. Yet in St. Thomas the
principle is at once qualified by the important proviso that,
quantum ad vim directivam, the prince is no doubt subject
to the law, albeit nobody except God can compel him to
submit to it. Further, the voluntas principis has vigorem
legis only inasmuch as it is ratione regulata. ~oth ~i~
directiva and the regula rationis are indeed n~g eiSe
than the expression of that natural and rational order
of justice wh · h Ii · th of
~
Moreover, along with this fundamental limitation to
the 'absoluteness' of sovereignty, St. Thomas conceives
of other possible limitations within the state itself, and is
even at pains to· show their necessity. This is clear in
his theory of th<? ra · al ni · n o ·tical we
The real meaning of St. Thomas's teaching on that point,
or rather its bearing upon the actual historical possibilities
and problems of his time, have recently been an object of
careful inquiry, especially with regard to the curious
theory which he expounds about the excellency of a
'mixed constitution'. On this point, the main features of
the regimen mixtum, which is referred to in the Summa
Theologica, 1 should be considered in CO?}.nexion with the
discussion as to the most convenient establishment of
1 Summa Theol. xa :iae, q. xcv, a. 4; q. cv, a. x.
40 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
the regimen unius which is found in the :first book of the
De Regimine. It is fairly easy to see that the best structure
""of a political regime is, according to St. Thomas, some
form of li_mited monarchy. This limitation implies the
dependence of the prince on the rule of law as the
expression of the will of the community. Political power,
though in essence, and according to the Roman teach-
ing, legibus solutus, must be constitutionally limited. The
mutual interaction of opposite doctrines and of the main
issues of medieval political experience are thus clearly
apparent in St. Thomas's teaching, and it is significant
that it was precisely to his authority that, two centuries
later, one of the first theorists of the English constitu-
tional system, Sir John Fortescue, repeatedly referred,
when he defended limited monarchy, not only as the
traditional system inherited of old, but as the best of all
.Rf>SSible forms of government. 1
Finally, there remains to be examined St. Thomas's
attitude towards the problem of the rela~on between the
tx,mporal and the spiritual power~. Unfortunately his
thought on this subject is nowhere systematically ex-
pounded. As Cardinal Bellarmin was later to complain
on this point, 'de Sancto Thoma quid senserit non est tam
certum'. The clearest account of St. Thomas's position is
contained in. t th chapter of the first book of
t e De · egimine Principum. I~ the doctrine of the neces-
sity o a · ~an affairs, of the insufficiency
of the humanum regimen and of its integration with the
divinum regimen. This duality is reflected in the r;gnum
and sacerdotium. There is no need to point out the tradi-
tional character of this doctrine, although, as Grabmann
• De Natura Legis Naturae, c. xvi, xxvi; De Lt11'1.iilnu Legum .Angliae, c. ix;
The GO'CJernance of England, ch. i.
 THOMAS AQUINAS
has remarked, its connexion with the Aristotelian doctrine
of ends is undoubtedly a novelty in the development of
medieval theory. It is with a view to the full attainment of
human ends, which culminate in the fruitio divina, that,.
the necessity of the two powers is shown; and although
this duality converges into unity in Christ, who is both
rex and sacerdos, in this world the two powers are committed
separately, the one to earthly kings, the other to priests,
and principally to the Roman pontiff, 'ut a terrenis essent
spiritualia distincta'. The different value of these ends
necessarily implies a subordination of the one power to the
other, of the regnum to the sacerdotium, and hence it follows
that to the summus sacerdos, the successor of Peter, the
vicar of Christ, the Roman pontiff, 'omnes reges populi
Christiani oportet esse subditos'.
However clear and definite in its outlines, this doctrine
is far from being free of all ambiguity. Let us remark for
ope thing that St. Thomas does not conceive of a relation"
b'etween ·two different societies, between state and church
in any modern sense, but of a distinction of functions,,.
(gubernationes, r~gimina, ministeria, potestates). But it is the"
relationship itself which leaves the field open to un-
certainty. To some interpreters, the assertion which is
made in the De Regimine of the necessary 'subjection' of
the temporal rulers to the authority of the Pope, has
seemed to imply an unconditional acceptance of that so-
called 'theocratic' doctrine which found its celebrated
assertion less than half a century later at the hands of
Boniface VIII and of his supporters. But such an inter-
pretation is, according to the best Thomist authorities,
quite inaccurate. It is enough to consider attentively the
argument of the De Regimine · Principum, to convince
oneself that the subordination or subiectio of the civil to
4547 G
42 MEDIEVAL POLITICAL THOUGHT
the spiritual power of which St. Thomas speaks, is such
only with regard to the end. 1
The Thomist doctrine of the two powers and of their
relationship can thus be taken to ex;eress tlie normal
medieval doctrine, and to summarize that particular in-
teiPr'etation wliich medieval Christianity contrived to give
of the fundamental Christian idea, ta.;~_hic:_h I have referred

-
iA. the introduction. It is a doctrine which -intist -not be
confused with later interpretations, which in furn represent
other and different developments of the Christian ideal.
-It can be called a theocratic doctrine, but only in the sense
that it admits of the necessary and supreme unity of all
power in God. It is a very different doctrine from that
which is usually called 'theocratic' and which asserts the
actual sovereignty, the plenitudo potestatis of the Pope
over the world. A reference to this latter idea which, as
Professor Scholz has conclusively shown, marks in many
ways the end of medieval conceptions proper, can be found
in the third book of the De Regimine Principum, which is
commonly attributed to Ptolemy of Lucca. According to )

the most authoritative interpreters, the teaching of Aquinas

only implies the asserti~n of an indire~t power of spiritual
over civil authority, a power of· guiuance-
and control,
which is a consequence of the superiority in value of the
ends to which spiritual rule is directed. But, on the other
hand, the fully developed theory of the potestas indirecta, -
the typical doctrine of the post-tridentine Church, is a
later development of the Christian ideal, a development
1 Nowhere in this treatise, at least in the parts (book I and first chapters of

book II) which can be with certainty attributed to St. Thomas, does St. Thomas
contradict the teaching which is contained, though not fully developed, in
several passages of the Summa TlzeolDgica, and which is substantially coherent
with the Gelasian doctrine of the distinction and comparative independence of
the two great spheres of human l.ifr.
 THOMAS AQUINAS 43
of which no doubt the germs are already contained in
St. Thomas's teaching, but which represents a~ adaptation
of the catholic doctrine to a social and political condition
greatly different from that of the Middle Ages. It implies,
the definite abandonment of the medieval idea of unity,-
which had provided the ground for the Gelasian principle
and for the notion of the respublica christiana, and the
recognition of a new problem unknown to the MidQ.le
Ages, the modern problem of the relation between church
and state.